agnesgoesadventuring-blog

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So I’m going to be bitter and old here for a minute.

The absolute refusal to allow anyone to use queer as an umbrella is both novel and regressive (I know, I know). For decades, queer was an accepted and neutral way to concisely refer to a coalition of loosely connected communities and identities. Queer theory, queer film, queer spaces, queer history.

This use came after another few decades of committed work in reclaiming the word from oppressors who flat out stole it from us.

It took a lot of effort to wrestle it back out of their hands, and now I’m expected to just give it over to them because decades of unity and collective action and shared experience don’t matter because a handful of (usually white, almost exclusively american) kids on this godawful website have deicded it’s illegal for me to “force it on others” and that I should instead just let them for LGBT or gay or whatever else on me.

Like, fuck off?

Fuck off.

I am going to refer to my community in the way that I have been doing for an entire lifetime. Not just my specific identity, which is queer as fuck, but the whole fucking shebang.

And I will not hand the word back over to straight people with a nice little ribbon and a coat of polish and say “here, some kids decided it was cool if I let you stab them with this word so here you go” like

Fucking, why would I ever.

Frankly, and I know how people are going to react to this but, frankly?

I damned well will use queer to refer to my community as well as myself, and anyone who wants to take it away from me can take it over my COLD DEAD QUEER LITTLE FINGERS.

I will not sit by and let antsy, nervous kids who don’t know a damn thing about our history talk down to me about how “well, actually” when they can’t even recognize the fact that trans people were still being policed out of here literally three fucking years ago.

The presumption and the ignorance are staggering.

So yeah.

Queer as in fuck you people in particular.

And, to my followers who are made uncomfortable by this, well. I will regret losing you on some level, but not enough to stop.

I fully intend to use queer as the umbrella term it has been for my entire life. LGBT never did my intersex, pansexual ass any favours anyway.

My point is, I’m not going to be referring to the “LGBT” community at all, anymore. It’s going to be 100% queer here, in a more conscious and consistent way than it has been before. Because, you see, even people who do use queer as an identity unashamedly have gotten into this pattern of being apologetic or conditional about it, with a constant, overbearing tone that even when we do use queer as a community term with have to hedge it and gentle it because it’s so dangerous.

but it’s fuckign not.

We spent decades pulling the danger out of it.

And ‘m not going to let it sneak back in.

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A+ response to ppl trying to police us using the word queer. I'm a man attracted only to other men but I hate the word gay. It's a traumatic word for me because me and me friends were harassed and abused for years by people in our school with that word. But nobody ever says that we shouldn't use the word gay as an umbrella for homosexual people. Like you said a lot of people in the queer community who aren't in those first letters of the acronym are really hurt by it and its used to hurt you by

gatekeepers but none of the ppl saying queer can't be an umbrella because it was used to hurt them or other people care about that. So their hypocrites and their whole argument falls apart because they're only caring about what they want and not the way other words or acronyms have been used to hurt other ppl and why they would be triggering for others.

I have yet to talk to a person pushing the "queer as a slur and if you use it as an umbrella term you're wrong" thing that has had a response to the fact that there are people for whom lots of different terms used as descriptors/umbrellas are incredibly traumatic because of how commonly they were used as a slur against them or the fact that a lot people in the queer community have been deeply hurt and excluded using the acronym that haven't displayed either what ultimately was complete disregard (sometimes it would start with an "I understand" or "I empathize" but it would ultimately end with them basically telling us it doesn't matter) or hostility and selfishness from the get-go. Or they were the blatant exclusionists who would just try to argue that we're not a part of the community and that our opinions and feelings don't matter. I would be delighted to talk to someone that didn't do that, but the thing is that the mindset that anyone using it as an umbrella term is inherently bad, no matter how much other umbrella terms have hurt them, is already at odds with the level of understanding and empathy required for that.

There are so many problems with so many of the terms used as umbrella terms, whether for the community as a whole or segments of it. So many of these terms have been used widely as hateful slurs. Gay, lesbian, even bisexual have been weaponized in ways that make them incredibly traumatic words for some people. Different words are used in these ways depending on things like location and era. The acronym is incredibly hurtful and even traumatic for a lot of people who don't fit in those first four letters, for whom the acronym has been used to exclude and gatekeep by people who tell them they don't belong. That acronym has been used to hurt and exclude, it's led to people who are vulnerable and struggling to doubt who they are, not be able to find a place where they belong, and cause further pain and trauma when they're already suffering.

But there's not really any outcry to never use those terms as umbrella terms, that anyone using them is bad and using hateful terms that hurt others. The amount of people who actually say that is incredibly small. Because for the most part we recognize that these terms carry a long and wide history of baggage with them that's going to be different for everybody, and what's a hurtful term for one person might be the safe haven term for someone else.

This "fine, use it for yourself, but don't you dare use it for the community because then you're calling all of us queer" idea disregards and ignores the fact that for a lot of us it's the umbrella terms being used instead that are so hurtful and traumatic. And there's very much, whether it's realized or not, an undertone of putting us in our place. "You can call yourself whatever you want, but don't ever forget that you're in OUR community." Telling people they're not allowed to use the terms the identify with for the community and that they have to use a term or terms that are hurtful to them is telling them that it's not their community, that they only have a place as long as the other "right" people say they do.

If someone is uncomfortable with any term, whether as a descriptor for themselves or as an umbrella term, I won't use it. But when I'm talking to other people, or talking on my tumblr, or just talking in general, I'm going to use the term, as a descriptor for myself and the community I'm a part of, that doesn't hurt me. That I'm comfortable with. Everyone else should do the same. I have no problem with someone who is hurt by the term queer using the acronym as an umbrella term. Because that's what they need to do. Because when THEY use it to talk about THEIR experiences in the community I'm capable of understanding that, unless they're an exclusionist gatekeeper that's using it as a means to exclude me, they aren't using it in the way that hurts me. I can take the knowledge of that and the knowledge that this is the term that they're comfortable with, that other terms hurt them and this one does not, and recognize that them using the term isn't about hurting me.

The acronym doesn't describe the community I'm a part of, the I identify with. The acronym describes a community that wants to either keep me out or remind me that I'm less than. That's not the community I'm a part of. I'm a part of the queer community, where everyone is welcome and equal, where nobody is less than or just tacked on in a lump with "the rest of them".  But I'm capable of recognizing that this is not the case for everyone and that not everyone is someone who uses the term to hurt me. I'm able to recognize that the meaning we place on words and terms matters and that every word and term has different meanings that can be placed on it. And I'm able to separate the times that a term is being used to hurt me from when it's being used to help someone else. I can recognize that and respect what these terms mean to people while still having the problems I have with them, the pain I have from them, and never wanting to use them myself or have others use them when talking to me or referring DIRECTLY to me.

It just takes empathy and understanding.

[agnesgoesadventuring-blog]

Are there any promo codes right now for free trials for Alpha? Jack is itching to watch a couple of their new shows, but we’re obviously trying to save every penny for our honeymoon.

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I might be real petty but I was so triggered by a lot of the ways molly/caleb shippers did things with that ship like with the face slap/forhead kiss and molly pinning him to the wall and other stuff so when I get Liam on Talks shooting down things that I saw these shippers saying was canon all the time it makes me feel so much better? like I saw them say so many times that molly and caleb were really close and that other than nott caleb was closest to molly and that obviously molly's death

changed him or moved and effected him deeply. But last night on TM Liam pretty much shot a hole in all of that. It's not like I'm sitting here laughing or that I'm like gleeful or anything. I don't know how to explain it it's almost like relief? I don't know. Maybe it's petty maybe it's not but I got enough crap from those shippers and had enough of them ignore me when I was p. much begging them to at least listen so I don't care a this point.

I don't think it's petty. As you said, it's not as though you're feeling joy at all of this. You said what you feel is relief, and that makes sense. There absolutely were a number of things that some of the shippers romanticized that were very problematic and that I know some people found incredibly triggering, and I know firsthand they way some of them behaved when confronted with even the slightest suggestion of that. A lot of the shippers acting that way were kind of pushing these ideas about what was canon, and even when those ideas didn't even match canon, it can be easy to become worried that these things that are so upsetting and triggering to you might actually be canon, might actually be when the players intend, when they're being pushed so hard by fans. So it makes sense that hearing either of the players confirm for you that those ideas are not canon and that they are not true, being able to know for sure that the show and players you love aren't perpetuating these things that are so hurtful to you, would makes you feel a ton of relief. It makes sense and there's nothing wrong with that.

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I've never been 100% clear on what Taliesin meant/means when he said "Molly was never going to change". It seems like he understand storytelling enough to know that static characters who never change and develop are not interesting or useful as storytelling components. And he was very clear at least in one episode of Talks with acknowledging that his reliance on mind altering magic and not thinking about the consequences was messed up and not healthy. So when you take those two things together, him understanding how storytelling works and admitted that there were flaws about the character that weren't healthy (and therefor should change), it would just seem weird if he literally meant that the character was never, ever going to change. There's also the fact that such a statement would be making assumptions about future stories and events that he couldn't know anything about (as they would be determined by Matt), saying that Molly would never, ever even be able to impacted enough by huge life events to change anything. So that makes me wonder if he was speaking more in the point of view of the character rather than what he intended to do with the character? That Molly, in thinking he had the moral high ground and that he had everything figured out, very much thought he never needed to change, that he thought he's reached the highest and best point of emotional/intellectual/interpersonal/moral development. And that he would therefor kick and scream his way through any change (and I might be remembering wrong, but I think I remember something on Between the Sheets where he said something like that last part). Or maybe at least he meant that things about Molly would change but that core personality and philosophy wouldn't? I just have such a hard time believing that he seriously meant "Molly would never change" literally, in terms of character development (or that he means Caduceus would never change) because it just doesn't make sense with other things he's said and just the fact that static characters don't work in longform stories, and that seems like something he would know.

Every time Taliesin reiterates that Molly was never gonna change, I die a little inside cause just….like how disappointing on every level.

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Beware the smiling DM

Bonus:

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it just kept getting worse

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Liam O’Brien, rogue extraordinare

bonus reaction gif:

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Jesus frickin christ, Tal did not get Molly killed on purpose because he "wasn't comfortable" playing him or didn't like him or some bull. and you say other people are projecting.

I never said he got Molly killed on purpose. I’ve never said anything remotely like that. All I said was that he seemed to pretty clearly not be comfortable playing a melee class (which make sense considering that he spent years playing a ranged fighter), and I might at some time have pointed out the difficulties in having race traits based on the Charisma stat when his charisma was 11. 

If you read that and got “he got Molly killed on purpose” out of it, then either you have incredibly poor reading comprehension or you are, for some reason, projecting a whole lot of stuff that’s not there onto my post and words.

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Last days you can register to vote for the 2018 midterms in all 50 states:

Alabama: OCT.22rd

Alaska: OCT. 7th

Arizona: OCT. 9th

Arkansas: OCT. 9th

California: OCT. 22rd

Colorado: Election day.

Connecticut: OCT. 30th

Delaware: OCT. 13th 

D.C: OCT. 16th

Florida: OCT. 9th

Georgia: OCT. 9th

Hawaii: OCT. 9th

Idaho: OCT. 12th

Illinois: OCT. 9th

Indiana: OCT. 9th

Iowa: OCT. 27th

Kansas: OCT. 16th

Kentucky: OCT. 9th

Louisiana: NOV. 17th

Maine: OCT. 16th

Maryland: OCT. 16th

Massachusetts: OCT. 17th

Michigan: OCT. 9th

Minnesota: OCT. 16th

Mississippi: OCT. 9th

Missouri: OCT. 10th

Montana: OCT. 9th

Nebraska: OCT. 19th

Nevada: OCT. 9th

New Hampshire: NOV. 6th

New Jersey: OCT. 16th

New Mexico: OCT. 9th

New York: OCT. 12th

North Carolina: OCT. 12th

North Dakota: Election Day.

Ohio: OCT. 9th

Oklahoma: OCT. 12th

Oregon: OCT. 16th

Pennsylvania: OCT. 9th

Rhode Island: OCT. 7th

South Carolina: OCT. 9th

South Dakota: OCT. 22rd

Tennessee: OCT. 9th

Texas: OCT. 9th

Utah: OCT. 7th

Vermont: Election Day.

Virginia: OCT. 15th

Washington: OCT. 8th

West Virginia: OCT. 16th

Wisconsin: OCT. 17th

Wyoming: OCT. 22rd 

Please register online if you aren’t already. Check your registration and your friends. Lots of people don’t have much time left to register! Don’t wait until the last minute! 

Register to vote ONLINE NOW!

[agnesgoesadventuring-blog]

Its so weird to me how people are talking about how these characters are so much worse then vox machina or that they're evil or on their way to being evil. Like if they were evil or heading that way they would kill a lot more. The let Algar go, the let the drow go. They seem really like as a group they're not going to kill if they don't have to. Some of them might prefer that as a first option but ultimately they dont.

This is a good point. I don't know that I'd get into comparing them to Vox Machina, because by the time we caught up with them a lot of the people/things they were fighting were much bigger levels of bad and in general their positions and situations were different. So I'm not going to go into comparing the two.

But I do think that people acting like the Mighty Nein are so horrible or are just careless murder hobos are either really, really exaggerating, or they're ignoring instances where they could have killed and didn't. In terms of not implicating themselves and not setting themselves up for potential danger in a future enemy, they probably would have been better off killing Algar. But they didn't. Killing the drow probably would have been easier and less risky, but they didn't. They didn't kill all of the bandits, and in fact twice let them go.

Yes, there have been people in the group who voted on "kill them" who might be more morally murky than the others, but as a group, they've made the decisions more than once to not kill people even when it would be safer to them to do so. And the people who initially voted "kill them" were fine with it, didn't try too hard to fight against it, and didn't try to sneakily do anything to undermine the group's decision.

They're a chaotic group who a lot of the time acts before thinking. And they might not be overly interested or invested in being "heroes" or saving people's lives wherever they go. They might be kind of selfish on the whole and do things that are more about their own self interest than anything else (though we do know that for some of them at least that is changing). But there's a big difference between that and "evil" or thoughtless murder hobos.

Perhaps, in the words of The Good Place, they're not bad people. They're medium people.

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Sexual orientation is about how we experience attraction. It’s not defined by behavior. If you’re attracted to both men and women, then you should not feel like you’re not allowed to identify as bi or that you’re not allowed to be in the community. Being in a relationship with a man does not exclude you from the community. The only people who think it does are exclusionists and gatekeepers. And their opinions don’t matter.

As an asexual, I have had such similar struggles. I’ve had a number of very scary encounters with both men and women insisting things like that they could “fix” me, that I was just “scared”. And I, too, had an incredibly unpleasant experience with a woman who insisted that I wasn’t asexual, that I was just too scared to admit I was a lesbian, and was incredibly sexually aggressive in texts and in person. When things like that happen, whether it’s with a woman or a man, and regardless of their sexual identity, that’s about them. It’s not about us, or what our sexual identity is, or how we experience attraction. They’re putting their own stuff (whether its their own identity issues or just their own selfishness in trying to take something we don’t want to give) onto us. But that does not define us.

I still get messages about how I’m not queer because I’m asexual, or because I’m marrying a man. People insisting that there’s no way I’ve ever experienced any kind of abuse or anything of the kind because of my sexual identity, that I have “straight privilege” and therefor can’t be queer and can’t have had any struggles because of my sexuality. Years ago messages like this would have crushed me. But I learned that these people don’t get to define who I am. I get to do that. I know who I am. I know what I’ve experienced. Those people don’t get a vote.

Exclusionists and gatekeepers are taking their own issues and putting them onto us. But them doing that doesn’t define who we are. Only we get to do that.

Lesbians that complain about bi women dating men instead of them are officially the “nice guys” of biphobia.

“Why would she date a smelly BOY when she could date me instead? I’d treat her so much better than any man could! I don’t understand what she could possibly see in a MAN!”

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Lesbians that complain about bi women dating men instead of them are officially the “nice guys” of biphobia.

“Why would she date a smelly BOY when she could date me instead? I’d treat her so much better than any man could! I don’t understand what she could possibly see in a MAN!”

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After seeing the way s lot of parents with kids who ended up having disabilities, mental illnesses, etc. that meant they had to be taken care of depend on their parents for longer than is considered socially normal have ended up resenting their children and treating them as a burden, and parents of queer kids disown them and act like their child's identity is an attack on them... I started reading the moral of Frankenstein as "if you're going to create life (have a kid), you'd better be prepared to be responsible for and deal with all the things that might not go the way you imagine or that might go wrong. And if you're not, then don't do it."

do you ever think about how weird it is that the moral of Frankenstein is kind of less just “graverobbing is weird and creepy” and more “take some fucking responsibility if you’re going to do so”

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@ girls who are starting to realize they’re bi, or have just begun identifying as bi, or who have come to terms with identifying as bi: 

I love you! 

Bisexuality is good. Being bi is good. Identifying as bi is good. 

There is no “good” or “bad” way to be bi. 

You are not dirty, wrong, impure, bad, or fake for identifying as bi. 

Your identity is pure, whole, and important. 

You are not “half” of anything. 

You don’t have to date anyone or have romantic/sexual experiences to wholly identify as bi. You are just as bi as bi girls who’ve dated people before. 

Whether you are in the closet or decide to come out, your decisions with respect to how you identify are entirely up to you and can’t be dictated by anyone else. 

I hope you come to love your identity, I hope you make peace with internalized biphobia, and I hope you become confident in who you are! 

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The person I reblogged this from deserves to be happy

I tried to scroll past this. I really did

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Because I remember disinformation being spread around the last election and I’m sure Russia will bring it back:

YOU CAN’T VOTE ONLINE.

YOU CAN’T VOTE FROM YOUR PHONE.

IN MANY STATES THERE ARE LEGAL CONSEQUENCES FOR PHOTOGRAPHING YOUR BALLOT.

DO NOT WEAR CAMPAIGN GEAR TO THE POLLS.

DO NOT TRY TO PERSUADE PEOPLE TO VOTE FOR A CANDIDATE AT THE POLLS.

DO NOT ENGAGE IN ANY KIND OF POLITICAL DISCOURSE AT THE POLLS.

NO ELECTION IS EVER A SURE THING, EVEN IF YOU’RE IN THE BLUEST OR REDDEST OF STATES.  IF SOMEONE TRIES TO TELL YOU THAT YOU CAN SIT THIS ONE OUT, THEY ARE EITHER IGNORANT OR MALICIOUS.

VOTE.